"You don't have to be French to enjoy a decent red wine," Charles Jousselin de Gruse used to tell his foreign guests whenever he entertained them in Paris. "But you do have to be French to recognize one," he would add with a laugh.
After a lifetime in the French diplomatic corps, the Count de Gruse lived with his wife in an elegant townhouse on Quai Voltaire. He was a likeable man, cultivated of course, with a well deserved reputation as a generous host and an amusing raconteur.
This evening's guests were all European and all equally convinced that immigration was at the root of Europe's problems. Charles de Gruse said nothing. He had always concealed his contempt for such ideas. And, in any case, he had never much cared for these particular guests.
